The Latest…

That's a fine distinction, but much like a mission statement, or a business plan, once you've decided the career v. job conundrum - and commit to it -- everything flows from it.There is no right answer...and the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive, although while a job can be part of a career...a career cannot be diminished to just a job.Once you've decided you want a voice over career, then certain jobs are not aligned with that decision. You start to see beyond hand-to-mouth, … [Read More...]

You might be sick of talking about VO rates...I promise I'll find other VO things to write about...but this week's blog seems to belong to this topic.The spectrum of online responses to the compensation issue reveals why this is such a tough nut to crack...why there may not be any definitive answers that fit all situations. Which brings me back to education, and why I said Monday in my article about SpeakPage, that "... WoVO is actively pursuing a program of educating its members to accept this … [Read More...]

Don't fault me or WoVO for focusing so much on voiceover compensation rates lately. We're only trying to keep up with the crazy pace of this industry. No one topic garners more interest among freelance voice actors than this issue.
World-Voices Organization members site "rates" as one of their top concerns. For those choosing a career in VO -- and willing to work hard for it -- this business had some promise. The threat of ever-descending rates, though, is challenging that paradigm. There … [Read More...]

My post Monday on SpeakPage sparked a lot of interest, and a wide range of comments. We heard from people who were convinced I was encouraging "bottom feeders", and others who did some quick math and decided it wasn't all that bad of a scale.Interestingly, on Anne Ganguzza's FB group "VO Peeps" a similar debate was raging over a simultaneous post from Andrew Bates offering a paid voice gig. You can go there to see the thread, but since compensation being offered was so low ($25), this post … [Read More...]

We're living in the middle of a paradigm shift. Every generation does...they just don't always see the forest for the trees. For us, the internet is disrupting most all the of the media channels that had been enjoying money-growing-on-trees status: TV, radio, music, publishing, photography, classified ads and more.An equal or even greater number of digital enterprises are picking up the slack creating talent opportunities, but with a few exceptions, pay scales are not keeping pace.Still, … [Read More...]

VO Social Media

Aren't these fun? You could almost forget that a great deal of valuable info is exchanged in the WoVOChats, because there's so much... well.... CHATTING going on.Today's session covered acres of … [Read More...]

'Bottom line about the back 'n' forth on the pages of this blog in the last week as it regards questionable VO coaching practices is that positive progress is being made in a spirit of respect. Watch … [Read More...]

To recap:
1) Last week I called to task a certain hi-profile VO coaching school for utilizing a series of increasingly rude autoresponder emails to coerce wannabe VO talent to sign-up for their … [Read More...]

VO Education

What's the old saying? "Fool me once, shame on you...fool me twice, shame on me".This has been a week of discovery, admonition, and contrition. Tuesday, I came down hard on what I believed to be a … [Read More...]

Clearly, the topic in yesterday's blog touched a nerve. See: "When Does an Offer Become Offensive"Nearly 800 readers voted with their visit. This is an issue people in our business care about...or … [Read More...]

VO Tools

Finally, a decent HD video camera with excellent audio inputs!You've seen me review other Zoom products on the pages of this blog. The Zoom H4, Zoom H4n, and Zoom H6n are all part of a parade of Zoom … [Read More...]

That's right... the contingency that confounds some voice talents, frustrates others, and and only clients seem to want, is now a regular feature of ipDTL. "Phone Patch" is different things to … [Read More...]

VO Niches

Rupert Murdoch? Nope. Sony? Huh-uh. Comcast/AOL/TimeWarner? Not even close. Google. I know, I know… Apple has $194 Billion in cash, and is a media darling, but Google (which Steve Jobs hated) is moving ahead of all other also-rans. Google is 136% bigger than #2 – Disney…and bigger than Disney and #3 (Comcast) combined. According to […]